Case Number 21294: Small Claims Court

The Trench

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All Rise...

Judge David Johnson spent some time in The Trench. That's what he calls his wife's abandoned vegetable garden.

The Charge

The Somme, July 1, 1916.

The Case

I know World War II gets most of the ink and Vietnam is typically looked at
with the most sympathy, but man if I don't get all queasy when conversation
shifts to World War I. For my money, this war was the most insane of the 20th
century. We're talking about thousands of soldiers hanging out in trenches and
then charging headfirst into machine gun fire wearing only colanders on their
heads. Brutal and bloody and hugely depressing.

Sort of like The Trench. I'll stop short of labeling it a complete
cluster-F, like the Battle of the Somme, the bloodiest day in British military
history and the backdrop for the film. A bunch of guys do cluster around each
other, though, as this is essentially 90 minutes of young actors walking through
a trench set and huddling and talking to each other.

For the grunts, you have Billy and Eddie MacFarlane (Paul Nicholls and Tam
Williams), teenaged volunteers who find themselves pulled into the
back-and-forth BS that springs up when you put a bunch of bored, terrified
soldiers in a culvert as bombs go off in the distance. Higher up the ladder is
Sergeant Winter (Daniel Craig, Quantum of Solace) and his confidant
Lieutenant Harte (Julian Rhind-Tutt), two officers grappling with the
approaching reality.

Eventually these characters come together in the last five minutes for the
event that we've known was coming since the opening titles: the trench run.
Three guesses how that turns out.

The known outcome proves to be a double-edged bayonet: 1) the film takes its
time fleshing out the characters, making the inevitability of the upcoming
tragedy that much more of an emotional punch to the testicles, but 2) there's a
chance that many viewers—like myself—won't make that investment,
knowing that naught but a meat shredder awaits.

Also, The Trench will likely test your fidgetiness. The entire film
literally takes place in a giant trench and is made up entirely of men talking
to each other; it could have easily been mounted as an off-Broadway play.
Whether you doze off or glue yourself to the proceedings will depend on how much
you buy into the characters.

Meanwhile, it appears this DVD slipped into a wormhole, transporting it from
1998 to 2011. The quality is miserable, starting with a laughably dated front
end menu, a full frame transfer that looks like it was lifted straight from the
BCC and one of the worst audio mixes I've ever heard. Those bombs in the
distance sound like someone pouring Gatorade on a space heater.

The Verdict

Too much of a grind. And the DVD is pathetic. Consider yourself
court-martialed.